Last week I wrote about how to make your own baby wipes at home. Jodi, a regular reader, wrote in and had this to say:

My concern with the addition of vinegar or sanitizer is if baby has diaper rash it could burn, also, would you put vinegar or sanitizer on your privates? And have you ever run out of toilet paper and had to use paper towel (It has happened to everyone…lol) its scratchy, even wet. If you use the solution (minus the vinegar) and a wash cloth it works wonderfully.

In hindsight, I agree — won’t vinegar sting? And sanitizer, while better smelling, will likely sting too. So what’s our solution, folks? What can we use that will clean and moisturize at the same time (within a budget, of course). Jodi says wash cloth, but I know many of you don’t want to go that route — so what do we do?

I would really love your ideas and input! Leave a comment!

Recently, I got this comment:

Hey lady,

So I’ve been following Bambigoesgreen.com everyday and as much as things interest me a lot, do you have anything more simple? With the monkey (read: baby girl) I don’t really have time to make my own paper (though I want to! lol) or money for a hybrid but I’d love to do little things. I bring my own bags when possible, but what does that really save? I heard that recycling one glass spaghetti sauce jar saves enough energy to power a tv for 3 hours, is that true?

Is there anyway you could do a day with a simple little tip and how it influences the world? Something everyone can do. I never used to care until Baby… Now Im one of those, leave-a-better-planet parents…. lol

Thanks!
Jodi

P.S. Im making strawberry soup this weekend

Thanks for the comment Jodi! So many good points! For starters, yes – I will start posting some simple tips everyday! That’s a great idea as I’m sure you’re not alone! As for the spaghetti sauce jar, let me look into it — I’m interested in hearing the facts on that as well! Thanks for the readership and comments, be sure to keep in touch!

I’m off to learn about the magic of spaghetti jars — wouldn’t that be something? I can’t wait to find out.

As you may have noticed, I’ve been slowly dubbing features based on the days of the week.  Here’s a rundown of the ones I’ve got so far:

Celebrity Thursday — Bringing you news of celebrities that are eco-friendly and making a difference in the world with more than just their blockbuster films and pretty faces.

Organic Recipe Friday — Delicious organic recipes from the perspective of someone new to the organic foods world. I’m not ‘granola’ — on any given day you could not pay me to eat twigs and berries for supper (well, berries maybe. Mmmm.) I’m trying to prove to you as well as myself that organic food doesn’t have to be weird, expensive, for total hippies… or whatever stereotype you might subscribe to when it comes to natural foods.

Saturday Recap — This one’s pretty self explanatory: Each week I’ll take the week’s most popular post and feed you something new about it, like comments from my readers, impressions, or a video demo.

Let’s add a few!

While I’d like to leave Sundays and Mondays for things that catch my eye or editorials that I’d like to get off my chest, that still leaves us with Tuesdays and Wednesdays that have yet to be named. Here are my thoughts on what those days should be:

I would like to dub Tuesdays DIY Tuesday where I can cover cool do-it-yourself eco projects I find for you to try out at home.  And don’t be fooled, I’ll be trying out these projects as well. I’m really looking forward to this day of the week — I love do-it-yourself projects that yield me cool gadgets and fun toys — and why not have them be from recycled, reused, or otherwise eco-friendly parts? Who doesn’t want a jar full of sunshine?

Now comes the tough love.  These bits are the ‘candy’ that I use to lure me – entice me, if you will – into becoming more eco-friendly. But what about the hard facts? Why should I become more eco-friendly, because some A-list celebrity is? Because I’d get to use neato gadgets and cool robot lawnmowers? Starting now I’d like to introduce a new weekly feature: Hard Truth Wednesday. Why we should be going green.  Sure, it won’t be glamourous, fun, or full of cool do-dads, but sometimes the truth shouldn’t be sugar coated, right?

Have some suggestions that would fit into any of these theme days? I’d love to hear from you!

Read the rest of this entry

This week’s most popular post was about the sun jar. But for this week’s Saturday Recap, instead of going over said popular post, I’m going to show you how to make a sun jar for yourself at home! Even better, right?

Jam jars store jam, the Sun jar collects and stores sunshine so that you can use it at night. Pass around the sunshine, Sunshine!

Components:

1. Ikea glass jar ($3.00)
2. Solar garden light ($10.00) – If you’re in Ottawa, XS Cargo sells these for $1 each. Seriously!
3. rechargeable battery (AA size)
4. Blu-tack
5. Tracing paper

Tools:

1. Screwdriver
2. Utility Knife
3. Glass Frosting spray

Click here to find out how to make one of these yourself!

This week’s recap: Nature Clean Laundry Detergent

Charlotte writes:

I love what you are doing here. I too use the Nature Clean products. The dish soap is also great. It doesn’t make as many bubbles as traditional dish soap does but if you feel you need more bubbles use a sponge and it helps with the suds. The Dish washer detergent is great too. The only product that I found that wasn’t as good as the traditional one is the window cleaner and that is only because the natural product required more elbow grease. Keep up the great work. I love seeing what comes next.

Thanks Charlotte! I, too, found that the window cleaner needed a bit more elbow grease than your standard brands. I suppose that’s a welcome sacrifice for a natural window cleaning solution. I did find that the window cleaner smelled wonderful though! Like fresh lemons — but naturally!

The above video will tell you more about Nature Clean Living’s amazing product line, available at Topia Greenstop among other places.

The votes are in! This week’s most popular post: May 25th is National Brown-Bag-It Day

It may seem like common sense to most of us, but you’d be amazed at how many people I see filling up food courts, pizza places, and McDonalds every lunch hour, buying their $10-$15 lunches and throwing away the cheap, grease covered cardboard and styrofoam containers minutes later. I’d take homemade leftover lasagna over slimey deep fried “beef” burgers any day!

I work from home so have no need to brown bag my lunch (wouldn’t that make me a weirdo though) but I do have a plethora of reusable cloth bags from a number of places like Loblaws, Loeb, Shoppers Drugmart, Topia Greenstop, Canadian Tire, and even a four-slot wine tote from the LCBO. And I use them all the time! Why would you even want to carry plastic if you can use those nice, comfortable cloth handles instead? Brilliant things.

R.B. writes:

I used to eat out all the time and I spent at least $15 a meal. I now eat at work for 2 meals a day(I work at a restaurant and eat for free) and usually go somewhere for dinner and it costs me maybe $20 including a tip. On the weekends, I eat breakfast and lunch at home and my boyfriend buys me dinner[:)] That saves me soooo much money!!

I really need to work on getting some more meals for free, myself! But until then, I’m happy to make a bit extra at supper time and stock up on the reusable food storage containers. There’s no easier way to make the guy in the cubicle next to you jealous than to pull out a homemade extra cheese lasagna, a caesar salad, and dinner rolls — no waiting in line, no carrying around cash, no putting on your coat, even! Mmmmmm environmentally friendly.

Back by popular demand — Intervale Green in the Bronx!

Saturday’s on BambiGoesGreen will bring more information/pictures/details about the stories that you the reader loved most during the week.

This week’s Saturday Recap features this video of Intervale Green. The Intervale Green complex, on Intervale Avenue between Freeman Street and Louis Niñe Boulevard, an infamous strip of South Bronx urban blight, is a new, green, low-income housing development. The building, developed by the Women’s Housing and Economic Development Corporation, or Whedco, a Bronx nonprofit group, opened to qualified low-income residents in February, and has filled about a third of its 128 apartments. Designed with a large, glass-windowed lobby, two green roofs and a sculpture-filled courtyard, the development, tasteful, sparkling and eco-friendly, could give many cookie-cutter luxury buildings a run for their money.

Reader Shirah from the University of Vermont wrote to me:

“It is wonderful to hear of green building projects in the cities, where it is the most visible to thousands of people every day. I think it’s quite clever that there is a green roof on it, as a visual reminder of it’s mission and goals. As cities grow more and populated, it is essential that we look to ways to create green housing that will be sustainable for our future. Here at the University of Vermont, (http://learn.uvm.edu/igs ) we realize that creating a more sustainable world is more obtainable when it becomes accessible and is encountered in a day to day basis.”

Thanks for the comment and information, Shirah!

Have your say! Drop me a comment any time and I may feature you on a Saturday Recap!